


Second Nature

by Im_The_Doctor (Bofur1)



Category: Video Blogging RPF, Youtube RPF
Genre: Banter, Caretaking, Caring, Chase is the ultimate dad friend, Coughing, Domestic, Even when he's reluctant he's a good caretaker, Eventual Happy Ending, Fever, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Influenza, Introspection, Mid-Canon, Multiple Selves, Reminiscing, Role Reversal, Self-Esteem Issues, Sickfic, Vomiting, Whump, Why not let Jackieboy be fathered for once?, compassion - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-26
Updated: 2018-05-26
Packaged: 2019-05-14 03:49:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14762045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bofur1/pseuds/Im_The_Doctor
Summary: With Schneep and Marvin otherwise occupied, Chase gets coerced into pulling out his fatherly tactics and taking care of Jackieboy when he’s come down with the flu.





	Second Nature

Jackieboy’s life had been full of close calls. His job was one that constantly put his safety on the line; it was his second nature and his first instinct to dive headlong into the fray of any mildly threatening situation. This, however, was something he always tried to avoid like the plague; it  _was_  the plague.

Every single time he got sick, he swore that he would rather face Anti in a sudden death match armed with nothing but his fists rather than lie on the couch being fussed over. With hollow, glazed eyes, a splotchy fever flush painted over his cheeks and a mountain of blankets pulled up to his throat, he knew he made up the most cliché image of a sick person possible. It was miserable, inconvenient, and  _embarrassing_.

That being said, it was an inevitable truth that because he was one of the most powerful members of the household, it had to be an equally powerful virus to take him down. He had exactly  _no_  chance of rising from this couch for work today. His shivering only worsened the cloying ache in his joints and with every breath it felt like there was a rusty nail dragging along the back of his throat that no amount of fluids would dislodge. That wasn’t going to stop his caregiver from trying, though.

“Here you go…” Jackieboy flinched slightly as the straw accompanying the voice poked at his lips, asking for entrance. “I got some juice from the fridge instead of coffee so it won’t burn your throat this time, okay? Just a few sips.”

Not bothering to open his eyes, the hero offered a raspy “mm-hmm” before prying his aching jaw open and catching the straw between his teeth. The apple juice  _was_  smooth and cool as it slid down his throat, but he couldn’t help but grimace at the off-brand taste. Maybe it was just his clogged sinuses ruining it, but he couldn’t bear too many sips.

“That any better, bro?”

“…Yeah.”

Chase pursed his lips ruefully, seeing through Jackieboy’s weak lie. “Sorry, man, I don’t really know how the doc does it,” he admitted freely as he set the cup on the nearby coffee table. “I’d ask, but his phone just goes straight to voicemail. He’s probably in a surgery.”

“What about Marvin?”

There was a pause as something passed over the younger Ego’s face—puzzlement, maybe, and a small twinge of hurt. Before Jackieboy could fully register it, it disappeared behind a small, polite smile. “He’s in the middle of rehearsals for his next gig,” he answered at last, his tone revealing nothing as he leaned back on his heels.

The functioning part of Jackieboy’s brain reminded him then that this was Chase he was talking to. Any small, unassuming thing might be turned the wrong way in his mind and strike a blow to his self-esteem…He must think Jackieboy would have preferred one of them over him as a caretaker.

“I was just aski—” Stiffening as his chest seized, Jackieboy had only a moment to haul the blankets over his face before the coughing fit smashed into him like a load of bricks. Over his flurry of wracking wheezes, he could hear Chase hissing through his teeth in sympathy. Almost thirty seconds later, he was still hacking and the vlogger finally shook his head and peeled some of the blankets back.

“Alright, alright, c’mon, let’s sit you up here,” he urged, wrapping an arm around Jackie’s back with firm gentleness. His hand didn’t leave once Jackieboy was upright, rubbing slow circles into his sweaty pajama shirt as air returned to his lungs in stops and starts. “That’s it, it’s calming down now…In through your nose, out through your mouth. You’ve got it.”

Jackieboy’s heaving shoulders stilled for only a moment before lurching once, twice more in a distinctively different fashion as his apple juice surged back up to his throat. “Cha—” he gagged, clapping his hands over his mouth and curling in on himself, shaking his head violently as telltale nausea prickled over his body.

“Oh—” Recoiling, Chase lunged to his feet and scrambled to the kitchen, tearing through the cabinets for the nearest bowl. “Hang on, hang on—!”

It was a tribute to the vlogger’s speed and agility, honed with hours and hours of trick shots, that he managed to find the perfect bowl and thrust it under his chin in time for him to retch into it. The force of his heaving nearly knocked his forehead against the bowl’s metal rim until Chase put a hand on his shoulder to steady him.

“It’s okay, you’re okay,” he soothed all the while, shushing Jackieboy’s pained groans and gags. “S’alright, just get it out. I’m sorry, man, I know it hurts…” Pursing his lips, he moved his hand from Jackie’s shoulder to the back of his neck, tsking worriedly. “You’re really warm.”

Sure enough, it took everything in him for Jackie not to lean back into Chase’s blissfully cool touch. Instead, releasing a slow, shaky exhale, Jackieboy weakly shifted the bowl to his left, indicating he was finished, at least for now. Chase hardly batted an eye as he took it back to the kitchen to rinse it out, but when he returned with the bowl in one hand and a damp towel in the other, he noticed how Jackieboy’s flush deepened. It wasn’t from his fever.

“It helps!” he retorted in answer to the other’s unspoken distaste.

“C’mon…” the older Ego croaked, shoulders slumping in mingling embarrassment and despair.

“Hey, don’t knock it till you try it,” Chase advised, easing Jackie’s head back with a hand on his forehead so his face could be at the best angle for the toweling. “Here, I’ll be Marvin if it makes you feel better.” Making his voice a bit gruffer and his accent a bit thicker, he announced, “For my next trick, I will be demonstrating something of wonder, awe, and amazement… _The Productive Dab_.”

The towel was softer than Jackieboy expected, or perhaps it was the gentleness of Chase’s strokes that fooled him into thinking it was. Despite himself, he couldn’t help but sigh in relief as the cloth was patted along his temples, cheekbones, jawline and the curve of his throat.

“There. Isn’t that better?” Chase questioned rhetorically once he was satisfied, brushing aside stray strands of Jackieboy’s hair so he could drape the folded towel over his forehead.

“S’like magic…” Jackieboy agreed hazily, his eyes drifting over to him. “’m…sorry, Chase. I was just asking about Henrik and Marv cos I…didn’t want you to see me like this.”

It took a moment but to the hero’s faint surprise, Chase barked an incredulous laugh. “What, seriously? Dude, you think I haven’t seen this before? This is nothing! Try taking care of a five-year-old when she’s got the flu. Brianna was the most pathetic little picture you could imagine, all bundled up in bed. Every time I thought she was asleep and I’d get up for food or coffee, she’d wake right back up and start crying, which only made her nose run everywhere.”

“Poor kid,” Jackie murmured.

“Yeah, it wasn’t pretty.” Chase’s expression grew wistful then, his attention wandering. “But when she cried, she wanted me to rock her. Walking around her room and rocking her was the only thing that would help.” Chuckling wryly, he glanced back at Jackieboy and opened his arms invitingly. “Think that would work?”

“Sounds nice, but I don’t think you could lift me.”

“Oh, you think I don’t lift, bro?”

Jackieboy laughed at that, the sound catching in his throat to turn into another dry cough. “Ow, ow—don’t make me laugh, it hurts.” Holding his breath for several seconds to calm down the warning ache in his throat, he settled his head more heavily against the arm of the couch, letting his eyes close. “Sounds like you’re a better caretaker than I figured,” he commented, trying to stay focused on the conversation and not on the headache trying to persist in dragging its fingers along his skull.

“Well, yeah. I don’t usually get to take care of you; you’re always taking care of me,” Chase pointed out. “You’re always taking care of  _all_  of us.”

“S’my job. I worry about you.”

“Right back at you,” Chase insisted. “Jackieboy…you know how much you mean to us, right? We wouldn’t get anywhere without you. You know that, right?”

“…Yeah. I think you could do just fine, though. More than fine. You’re…you’re really amazing, Chase. I couldn’t ask for you to be any better. You make all of us proud and  _I_  wouldn’t get anywhere without  _you_.” Though his weary tone didn’t change as he said those words, Jackie could feel a slight sting in his chest and behind his eyelids as emotion stirred. He took a lesson from Chase’s daughter, however, and pressed it down deep in his stomach before it could clog his sinuses and make the ache in his throat any worse. “For one thing, I’d have puked all over these blankets.”

Silence reined for a few minutes after that remark, until Jackieboy’s mind was starting to wander into the dim, delirious thoughts that were almost dreams. Eventually Chase muttered something or another that might have been thanks before rising to his feet. “You’ve gotten really sappy; your fever must be gettin’ to you. I should let you rest.”

“Wait, wait—don’t go—” In his bleary haste, Jackie’s plea sounded much more tragic than it was technically meant to, but it did give Chase pause. Deciding to roll with it, the older Ego widened his eyes pitifully. “Henrik and Marvin always stay with me when I’m sick…”

“Would it make them proud?” Chase quipped, earning nothing but another longing blink in return. Jamming his hands into his pockets, he shook his head and relented. “Just let me grab my headphones real quick so I can listen to music in case you start snoring.”

Jackieboy’s next blink was one of confusion. “Wh—I don’t snore!”

“Sure, not usually, but if you’re crashed hard, you do. On those nights Marvin always tries to trick me into swapping rooms with him, since you two share a wall,” the vlogger announced guiltlessly as he skirted past the coffee table and marched out of the room for his headphones.

Digesting this information with a mild scowl, Jackieboy huffed, coughed a few times and then let his head slide off the armrest onto the couch cushion itself, effectively burying himself under the blankets. He had a nagging feeling that he would overheat sometime while he was napping, but at the moment the warmth the blankets provided was pretty comforting. After he had settled into a breathing pattern that wouldn’t stir a coughing fit, he finally felt free to doze off.

When he was still  _just_  semiconscious of his surroundings, he heard Chase return, humming softly to the tune in his headphones as he settled down in the chair nearby. The sound lulled him all the way down into darkness, and his sleep was peaceful. He didn’t make a sound.

**Author's Note:**

> I figured you guys might appreciate some fluff while I work on the next chapter of In Time of Need...We all know _that_ story's nature :D I hope you enjoyed! Leave a kudos or a comment to tell me what you thought; I'd love to hear from you!


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